Head Coach Don Zimmerman enters his 22nd season at UMBC and his
29th as a collegiate head coach. Amongst Division I head coaches,
the Retriever mentor stands eighth with 228 victories and is 16th
in winning percentage at .598 entering the 2015 campaign. In the
all-time coaching annuals of Division I lacrosse, Zimmerman is 26th
in total victories and 47th in winning percentage.

Coach Zimmerman has made 13 NCAA Tournament apperances in his
tenures at Johns Hopkins (`1984-90) and UMBC (1994-present). His
1984, 1985 and 1987 Hopkins teams earned national titles and he
coached the Retrievers to their first NCAA Tournament appearance in
1998.

In 1984, he became the first man to lead a team - the Johns
Hopkins Blue Jays - to a national championship in his first season
as a head coach.

Zimmerman won two more national titles at Hopkins, then began
to build the program at UMBC, starting in the spring of 1994. He
piloted the Retrievers to four consecutive NCAA Division I
tournament appearances from 2006-09, a feat accomplished for the
first time in the school’s Division I lacrosse history. In
2009, the Retrievers posted a 12-4 record and won their third
America East title in four years. The previous season, UMBC set a
new school record with 11 straight wins before a tough 10-9 loss at
second-seeded Virginia in the first round of the NCAA
Championships. UMBC climbed to a school-record ranking of No. 5 by
the USILA in mid-April and was ranked No. 6 in the final
poll.

Zimmerman was named America East Conference
Coach of the Year by his colleagues in both 2008 and 2009. The
Retriever mentor was the 2008 Coach of the Year
inLaxPowermen’s
lacrosse Fan Awards, he achieved career win No. 200 in 2010 and is
10th among active coaches with 202 victories in 24
campaigns.

"UMBC is a well-known and respected name in
terms of Division I lacrosse, and the volume of emails from
(prospective student-athletes) that we receive today versus six or
seven years ago is incomparable," Zimmerman said. "The kids realize
that we are a high-tier program. We have been champions of the
America East Conference; the NCAA appearances go a long way and the
reputation of the university has also made us more attractive
because kids and parents are not only looking for an opportunity to
play Division I lacrosse, but to get a quality
education.

"I have been very fortunate to be at good
schools and worked with good people and I love what I
do."

Zimmerman has signed a contract extension to
remain at UMBC through the 2015-16 season.

"We’ve had some success and that is due to
the quality of players that we have been able to attract,"
Zimmerman said. "It takes everything to fall into place; I’ve
had good assistants, we’ve recruited good players and gotten
tremendous support from the university, and as a result we have
been successful. Coaching lacrosse at UMBC is both challenging and
rewarding. Having the opportunity to work with quality young men
with a unified goal of competing for a national championship and
playing lacrosse in Baltimore - the cradle of the sport - is
something special."

"Don Zimmerman is one of the nation’s top
collegiate lacrosse coaches," UMBC president Dr. Freeman
Hrabowski said at that time. "He is a
gifted teacher and mentor, and we are delighted he will remain at
UMBC, keeping our lacrosse program nationally
competitive."

"Coach Zimmerman is recognized nationally as one
of the brightest offensive minds and head coaches in the game,"
UMBC Director of Athletics Tim Hall said. "Our student-athletes are
well-prepared every time we take the field. We fully expect to
capture another America East title under Coach Zimmerman's
leadership."

The respect that the Retriever mentor has garnered nationally
and globally truly resonated in 2013. He was part of a nine-member
class (the 19th overall) to be inducted into the
Johns Hopkins University Athletic Hall of Fame on Sat., April 20.
The previous evening, the partisan crowd at Albany gave him a
standing ovation when he was honored before a rivalry game between
the Retrievers and the Great Danes.

Later that spring, Coach Zimmerman’s
book, Men’s Lacrosse, co-authored with
Peter England, was released by Human Kinetics and received
outstanding reviews from the lacrosse community. Less, than two
weeks later, the Retriever mentor led the lacrosse
program to Japan for the third time in the past nine years. He is
credited with the widespread popularity of the game in the Land of
the Rising Sun.

Widely recognized as one of this nation’s
premier teachers of the sport of lacrosse, Zimmerman traveled to
Buenos Aires, Argentina, to assist in the development of the game
in the South American country in December 2004. It was not
Zimmerman’s first venture in the international development of
the sport—in fact, the Retriever mentor has taught the game
on four different continents. He has also spent time in Europe
(Great Britain) and Asia (Japan).

"The game of lacrosse is the best game out there
and I would love to see it played in the Olympics," Zimmerman said.
"It’s incumbent upon us to introduce and develop the game
when opportunities occur in order to reach that goal."

"My coaching philosophy has always focused on
teaching the fundamentals - the little things that make the big
difference." Zimmerman said. "Lacrosse is a game of skill and
precision, best played when using a simple, basic
approach."

In the spring of 1993, UMBC changed the
complexion of its lacrosse program by appointing Don Zimmerman as
its head coach. Success did not happen overnight. After a 7-7
campaign in 1994, UMBC struggled to records of 4-9 and 3-9 the next
two seasons. But even then, the program was changing. A position
was created for a full-time assistant coach in 1996, and UMBC
recruited a trio of players from The Boys’ Latin School that
formed the nucleus of an evolving team.

In 1997, UMBC was the most improved team in the
country, finishing at 9-3 and posting its highest final season
USILA ranking of No. 16. The 1998 season opened with tough losses
to Navy and Towson, but a now more experienced team rebounded by
winning eight of the next 10 games, including a victory over No. 9
Georgetown. Then, on May 2, 1998, the Retrievers shocked everyone
in the lacrosse world except themselves when they scored a 12-8
victory over No. 1 Maryland. The victory propelled UMBC into its
first-ever NCAA Division I Championship appearance and made the
hard work of Zimmerman and his staff worth the wait.

The 1999 Retrievers proved the previous year was
no fluke, as wins over Navy, North Carolina and Maryland once again
landed UMBC in the NCAA Tournament. In 2003, UMBC took the
second-biggest leap in the lacrosse power rankings, from 29th to
13th. In its second America East Conference season in 2005, UMBC
captured the regular-season title by defeating Albany on its home
field. In 2006, the Retrievers captured their first America East
championship and earned a berth in the NCAA Tournament. In 2007,
Zimmerman’s squad became the first UMBC Division I team to
advance in NCAA Tournament play with a first-round win at
Maryland.

In the spring of 2005, UMBC Athletics completed
a $5 million stadium locker room complex. Among its many amenities,
it is the first building on campus to be completely outfitted with
fiber-optic cable. Moreover, the stadium field was outfitted with
Sportexe’s Momentum turf, the same product used at M&T
Bank Stadium in Baltimore.

"Our goal has always been to get ourselves to
the same level as the other top teams in the country," Zimmerman
said. "What we’re doing in lacrosse runs parallel to what
we’re doing as a university. We feel we have an outstanding
product at UMBC and we want people to know that."

Zimmerman’s entire playing and coaching
career has been based on winning. He led Johns Hopkins (14-0) to
the national title in 1984 and piloted the Blue Jays to another
pair of championships in 1985 and 1987. The Baltimore native
chalked up 73 wins against only 15 losses in his seven years at
Homewood. After leaving JHU after the 1990 season, Zimmerman served
as an assistant coach at Loyola College from 1991-93.

Zimmerman prepped at St. Paul’s School,
where he was a member of three MSAA Conference championship teams.
A 1976 graduate of Johns Hopkins, Zimmerman played under the late
Henry Ciccarone, received Honorable Mention All-America recognition
and was awarded the Turnbull-Reynolds Award for Sportsmanship and
Leadership in 1976. In his first season after graduation, Zimmerman
was named coach of the Hopkins B squad.

After spending a year as assistant coach at
Princeton in 1978, he joined Willie Scroggs’ staff at North
Carolina. The Tar Heels won a pair of national titles (1981, 1982)
in Zimmerman’s four years in Chapel Hill. He then returned to
his alma mater the following year, and when Coach Ciccarone retired
after the 1983 season, Zimmerman became head coach.

On Jan. 25, 2002, Coach Zimmerman was honored
with induction into the Greater Baltimore Chapter of the United
States Lacrosse Hall of Fame. UMBC standout defenseman Gary Clipp
(‘77) joined him as an inductee in a gala affair at
Martin’s West in Baltimore.

Zimmerman also served as an assistant coach of
the United States team in the 1986 World Games and was a coach for
the South squad for the 2002 North-South All Star game. Zimmerman
and his wife, Dorothy, reside in Towson. The Zimmermans have two
children, Emily and Jake, who just completed four years on the UMBC
lacrosse squad in 2013.